When a restaurant is named after the chefs' mother, it's as sure a sign as any that the place is going to be good. You just don't take in vain the name of the woman who raised and fed you. Brothers Jorge, Patrick, and Frank Mendoza-Iturralde christened not one but two restaurants, plus an Italian grocery, after their mother, Monica. The message is clear: These family-run businesses, all in the North End, are labors of love.
And when you name your restaurants after your mother, you don't rest on your laurels, even when you have a solid neighborhood following. Three years ago the brothers turned their smaller place, then called Monica's Pizzeria, into the adorable Trattoria di Monica - a nook with exposed brick walls, wood floors, and a menu packed with fresh pasta. Then last year they closed down their bigger place, Monica's Restaurant. They gutted and refurbished it, got their hands on a full liquor license, and added on a separate bar area. The new incarnation, Vinoteca di Monica, opened in March. Sadly, their mother passed away before she got to see it.
It's a worthy tribute. The main dining room feels warm and welcoming, with deep red walls and comfortable red-and-white striped banquettes. The place is decorated with artwork created by Patrick and another brother, John - including somewhat random renderings of the Beatles, Jim Morrison, and a guy getting ready to hack the head off a chicken. Earlier in the evening, parents bring their kids for dinner; later couples and groups of friends turn up. There's a long wine list of bottles from Italy. As for the menu, it hasn't changed much - unfussy antipasti, salads, pasta dishes, and entrees that shift a bit with the seasons. Each night, according to Jorge, who is the chef at Vinoteca di Monica, there are 10 to 15 specials. (Patrick and Frank do the cooking at the trattoria - their food is less refined than Jorge's, but still very tasty.)
That bounty is welcome, but it does tax the old bean. By the time the waiter has finished reciting the last entree ("aaaand finally we have a zuppa di pesce with mussels, clams, shrimp, salmon, scallops, squid, and half a lobster in a tomato broth with crostini"), the pizzetta appetizer with caramelized onions? gorgonzola? and weren't there walnuts? is a distant memory.
On a recent evening, the list includes fresh tajarin - long, thin egg noodles - tossed with a little bit of cream sauce, peppered with plentiful shavings of mahogany truffles and parmesan. The dish is both delicate and earthy. We eat it beside a dish off the menu, the same noodles mixed with peas and pieces of prosciutto that have been sauteed into crispiness. Without the cream sauce, the egginess of the noodles comes out, and the peas are cooked till they're sweet and nearly caramelized. The two dishes based on the same noodle taste completely different, and it's hard to say which is more compelling.
A special of rack of lamb is cooked rare (though ordered medium-rare); the flavor of the lamb, barely salted, stands on its own. It's served with potatoes and sweet roasted garlic, but this dish is really about the meat. As for that zuppa di pesce, it's barely a zuppa - it's more of a seafood platter - but it does contain an aquarium's worth of pesce. The mussels, lobster, et al. come arrayed on a long plate with a bit of bouillabaisse-like broth at the bottom. I wish there were more of it to sip between bites of head-on shrimp and tiny, tentacled squid.
There is one pitfall to the specials menu: Unless you ask, the price tag is a mystery till you get your check. And when you're faced with such big portions of seafood, such generous amounts of truffles on your tajarin, it becomes a nagging question. If money is an object, inquire first, because those dishes are $46 and $38, respectively. (The rack of lamb is $36.) Though they're very good, it's also possible to eat well at Vinoteca di Monica for much less.
One night in the bar area, we feast on pasta off the menu, dishes in the low $20 range: rigatoni and agnolotti, served in similar sauces based on red wine, beef, and tomatoes. The rigatoni is served with shreds of braised beef, while the agnolotti is stuffed with meat cooked into an even more tender state. Monica's pasta, tender and fresh, is handmade at the trattoria, and sold at Monica's Mercato. Unlike so much restaurant pasta, it's memorable - Mendoza-Iturralde says later that he wants to make food that "leaves you with a taste memory," and his pasta succeeds. This is comfort food that avoids being dull.
Appetizers here are also satisfying: Tuscan crostini, smeared with luscious chicken liver pate and garnished with cranberries cooked in simple syrup; crespelle stuffed with fontina and mushrooms (rich and cheesy, but stingy with the funghi); thin sausages of crumbly pork in a tender casing, curled into a disconcertingly intestine-like shape and served with roasted red and yellow peppers in an agrodolce sauce that perks up the taste buds. "Of all the appetizers I have had," one diner says of the sausages, "these deserve a place in my appetizer hall of fame."
Dessert offerings include a pleasant crème brulee, rich and thick, with a thin coating of sugar, and a tiramisu that could actually use a bit more rum. (The version at the trattoria is better, light and boozy.)
The menu in the bar is the same as that in the dining room, though the night we're there we don't hear about any specials - a fluke, Mendoza-Iturralde says later. But the atmosphere is different, fun where the dining room is cozy. This side of the restaurant gets busier as the other starts to empty out. A couple plans their vacation over pasta; smokers leave and return, leave and return; young guys in black leather jackets and caps watch sports, referring to the Celtics cheerleaders by name when they appear on-screen. It seems like they live down the street, and maybe grew up with the bartender; he ably divides his time among talking about girls, mixing cocktails (he makes a mean Negroni), and serving the people at the few bar tables.
"We wanted a place where our neighbors and friends could come by, have a drink, watch the game, have a quick bite," Mendoza-Iturralde says. That's just what they've created, and the neighborhood feeling is as pleasing as the pasta.
Devra First can be reached at dfirst@globe.com.
